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Life time: to minimize damages, defendants often use numbers, not medical evidence, to forecast a short life expectancy for a catastrophically injured plaintiff. Combat this defense by showing that your client is more than a statistic.

Article Excerpt
Perhaps the most difficult aspect of a case involving a catastrophically injured individual is the issue of life expectancy. When liability is established, the defendant's exposure for significant future medical expense is reduced if the jury adopts the defense expert witnesses' prognosis of shortened life expectancy. Simply put, fewer years of expected life means less burden on the defendant for future care. However, it also means a greater and potentially life-threatening burden for a plaintiff who outlives the life expectancy forecast.

Since the late 1980s, defendants have increasingly relied on a growing cadre of experts who base their forecasts on the so-called statistical approach. Experts employing this approach tend to rely for support on a few published sources, all by Richard Eyman, a biostatistician. (1) Other experts are publishing articles with increasing fervor in an attempt to gain legitimacy. (2)

At first blush, the statistical approach appears to represent a formidable blend of statistics and the medical sciences. In fact, many defense experts in this area are becoming so bold as to suggest that doctors are unqualified to testify on the issue of life expectancy, and that only insurance company actuaries and statisticians are properly qualified to do so.

For example, the following quote comes directly from an article by two purported life-expectancy experts, David Strauss and Robert Shavelle, and is posted on their Web site.

At least privately ... most physicians will admit--or even emphasize--that predicting longevity is not their expertise. The situation is much like that of setting a life insurance premium: you go to a physician for a physical examination, and the results are transferred to the insurance company's actuaries. Actuaries are the people with the expertise to turn the medical report into...